On one hand, we have all this data at our fingertips, so why shouldn’t we be able to give people exactly what they’re looking for?

Unfortunately, this sort of tailor-made advertising has a delicate and tricky balance: Catherine says maybe there should still be a little mystery and romance preserved with the consumer experience.

In Episode 32 we take some time to examine the new normal. Re-targeting ads initially had some degree of creep factor to them but are now commonplace. If your customers visit your site and leave, you can simply re-target them by tracking where they go next (Facebook, Google) and then try hitting them again with another ad.

But while it may work for some highly competitive industries, people mostly just ignore these types of “commonplace” ads.

We also discuss how, in many cases, the mere need for re-targeting can reveal a deficiency in your original marketing strategy. If you’re having trouble getting your customers to organically return to you, then perhaps something is amiss with your marketing strategy on a more fundamental level.

Catherine also discusses using native advertising as an alternative to re-targeting ads. When someone is reading an article that pertains to your industry, native advertising allows you to provide sponsored links at the bottom of the article for more options of “related articles” or “other news you might enjoy.” These types of sponsored links are relevant, and they allow your prospective customer to easily click-through to your content.

In this episode, you will also hear Catherine talk about how to use public relations to give you great coverage for your company. She also talks about two-device tracking. And admittedly, there may be a couple of rants in this episode, warning you against a few strategies that Catherine feels you should never use! You don’t want to miss this one. Join us!

“If you were doing door-to-door sales, you would not go up and knock on somebody’s door three days in a row to sell them something, when they have already said, ‘Oh, I’ll think about it,’ or ‘I’m not really interested.’ You would never do that! So, I always tell people to think of their online marketing the same way.”